Arts

THE POETRY, ART AND MUSIC KEEP FLOWING; and the Prayer.Gadget is COMING SOON

Ode to My DNA By Chelsea Page-Collonge (c) 2003

Present in every living thing You direct my growth from cell to breath Too small for radar your words encode my body my tangible presence You connect me with all life bonobo chimpanzee to California poppy yet make me unique wheat­colored hair swollen joints Oh spiral fishing line you connect my parents to their maybe­grandchildren Lie snug in my egg cell in the pink pillow of my womb All this wonder wound tight in your bouncy spring And DNA, I fear for you bringer of order yet so mutable mutateable and like radiation, invisible Another Chernobyl bunker busting nukes or even the cell phone in my pocket could scramble your wisdom make my babies born with open skulls or heart defects like the kids of Belarus Seaborg invented it here on Berkeley campus plutonium manufactured to kill enemies, it can extinct whole species with its gamma­attack on the genetic code of life You created us, DNA Don't let us destroy you Encode new proteins for a brain that thinks ahead a heart that respects life Help us evolve

She Danced By Marie Molloy (circa) 1995

She danced on the stoney surface of the suffering desert,never wincing, ever weaving, gyrating, gesturingto convey her stories in motion, gracefully, clearly.

She dripped pale green goop on a painted plastic planet,bowling us over with the impact of that imageof Washerwoman God cleaning up our messes.

We bowed our heads in shame with good reason envisioninga pilot’s picture of the chicken-poxed desertwhere our “god-bomb” has defaced the earth’s surface,melted down its innards, poisoned its life-giving water,and polluted its clear air about us wellwith insidiously penetrating alpha particles.Savage sacrilege of our Creator’s sacred creations.

(Written after a visit to the NNSSwhere Sr. Mary Ann Kirk danced barefoot during the liturgy on the desert.)

The Golden Rule By Robert Majors

It starts with the golden rule Treat each other as brothers doWhy would you do the things you knew Would terroriz your every moveBreak all the rules, but just to live Point a loaded gun at your head Poison your food before you eat Talk with no one listeningNow tell your kids to go to school And have them break all the same rulesMake sure they eat before they leave They yell "No" but who's listeningNot you and I may be the same About the men we fly those planes Over, Admit it would be wrong If they flew them over your sonIf we treat them how we expect They will treat us, then what is left For the children when we are dead Kill them, or become targets, NoA Joshua tree is watching me While I walk to Indian Springs The guard at Creech has armed his gun The sun is tucked under my armI walk for peace, But run for God To feed the bread the Sun has broughtI start to speak, but not for long The cops have come The gun is drawnThe sheriff said I need to leave I said I need him to believe That how we treat the world is wrong Patrolling planes and dropping bombs.We’re staring down a camera lens At innocent civilians Who traveled in the distance Of our invading militantsWe drop the bombs when they start to pray Through the screen they’re not the same As us We’ll never forget They may choose to remember thisIt seems the world’s controlled by fear We grip our swords and raise our spears It won’t seem to disappear We put our shields to our ears.And blame it on China’s bigger gear Like what if they fight us and we’re not prepared Failure to plan is a plan to fail But why do we plan to killWhy can’t we plan to heal When the world has gotten ill Drop our swords and burn our shields And make love of a battlefieldWe can procreate a state of mind That will erase the borderlines That separates all the kinds Of men that are alike insideWe will be free to reunite Feel not the need to hate and fight We will turn water into wine Each cup will spill the fruits of life Yes it starts with the golden rule And it ends with it too.

Robert Majors is the Event Coordinator for NDE. He is also a student at UNLV, working on a degree in Civil Engineering. A portion of this poem was published in Desert Voices (June 2017)